Did you know that the British-born St. Patrick was kidnapped and enslaved by the Irish? Eventually he escaped. In later years he became a missionary, and whom did he serve? The Irish, his former enslavers.
Pause for effect.
In honor of St. Patrick’s selfless love, here is a recipe for shamrock eggs. I don’t see a connection either.
Bribe matching small people to remove the seeds and other guts.
Heat the oil or butter (mmmmm, butter) in a pan set on medium-low-ish heat.
Drop the pepper rings, heretofore known as shamrocks, into the pan.
Crack an egg into a bowl and pour it gently into a shamrock. Repeat for each shamrock, or crack the eggs straight into the shamrocks.
Drop a couple tablespoons of water into the pan and cover immediately to trap in the steam. If you have a glass cover, watch for the eggs to firm up, or just lift the cover and peek after about 3-5 minutes. This will create the perfect sunny-side up eggs. (Thanks to Jan the Pepper Jam Lady in Yorba Linda for that tip!) Cook longer for more firmly set yolks.
That’s it! Serve with Screaming Baby Biscuits and a pint of Irish ale. Oh, wait…breakfast. Never mind the ale.
If you love green peppers, you’ll like these eggs. If you don’t like green peppers, these will make you gag. I’m nothing if not honest…to a fault. Speaking of being honest, I don’t drink Irish ale for breakfast…or at all.
*My cooking oil of choice is coconut oil for its health benefits. When I don’t want the coconut flavor, I opt for expeller-pressed ultra clean, which has no noticeable flavor.
Here’s the short and sweet printable version.
St. Patrick’s Day Breakfast: Shamrock Eggs
Recipe Type: Breakfast
Prep time: 10 mins
Cook time: 5 mins
Total time: 15 mins
Serves: 2-6
A charming and healthy shamrock shaped egg dish with only a few ingredients.
Ingredients
1 green bell pepper
4-6 eggs
oil or butter
water
salt and pepper to taste
Instructions
Slice peppers into 4-6 rings. Remove seeds and core.
Heat oil or butter in a pan on medium-low heat.
Toss the pepper rings into the pan.
Crack the eggs into the pepper rings.
Splash a couple tablespoons of water into the pan and immediately cover.
Cook for 3-5 minutes for soft eggs, longer for a firmer set.
2.2.1
What is your go-to St. Patrick’s Day breakfast re.cipe?
This post goes out to Facebook fan Jessica. Good luck and have fun with your first major Thanksgiving cooking!
I love to prep as much of my major cooking ahead of time as possible, especially for Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Easter. (I’ve even fed the family breakfast before bed to get a jumpstart on the next day. Note to self: bad idea.) Sometimes my prep backfires, like when my pre-peeled potatoes turn brown.
If I were to ask my husband about that phenomenon, he would draw on his pre-med training and say something all science-y, like the browning is caused when the polyphenol oxidase enzyme is released from the potato’s cells upon cutting. The enzyme immediately begins reacting with the oxygen in the air to turn the phenol compounds within the tuber brown in a process called oxidation.
Oxidation, shmoxishmation. I just call it ugly. They’re still perfectly edible, mind you, but they aren’t perfectly pretty. I like my taters to be pretty before I mash them into an unrecognizable pulp.
Here’s how you can get a jump start on your potatoes without the ugly.
How to Keep Potatoes from Turning Brown
Peel and rinse the potatoes. (So far so simple.)
Place them (whole, sliced, or diced) in a bowl, pot, bucket, trough, whatever, and cover them completely with water. Completely! Taters in, air out.
Store the bowl in the refrigerator. (I cheat on this step if I don’t have room in the frig. Shhh.)
That’s it! Told ya it was simple. Simpler than that whole polyphenol oxidase thingie.
Notes:
I only do this overnight. Some people claim you can do this up to three days in advance as long as you replace the water and rinse the potatoes daily. Some people might be right about that. (See the comment section for other opinions.)
Others add a splash of lemon juice to keep potatoes from turning brown. This is a good practice for something that might be sitting in open air. Scientifically, however, the browning occurs when the potatoes come in contact with the oxygen in the air, which is an impossibility when the tubers are immersed in water whose oxygen is firmly bonded to hydrogen and won’t be oxidizing any taters. I save my lemons for lemon pie. Mmmm…pie.
I know you’re all itching to know why potatoes don’t turn brown after they’re cooked. Well, if I were to bother my pretty little head about such things, I would tell you that heat denatures the enzyme, rendering it inert, so it no longer reacts with the oxygen to transform the phenol compounds. (Heat kills enzymes.) But all that science just gives me a rash.
Another alternative: crockpot mashed potatoes
My dear blog friend Stacy from Stacy Makes Cents has a recipe for crockpot garlic mashed potatoes in her e-cookbook, Crock On. Crocking your taters would entirely free you up from even having to think about them. It would almost be like having a personal chef make the potatoes for you, and all you had to do was eat them. Crockpots are neat like that.
Read my review about Crock Onhere, or, if you want the recipe for crockpot mashed potatoes for Thanksgiving and don’t want to bother with any ol’ reviews in case it talks about phenols and denaturing enzymes (which it doesn’t),buy it now for $5, or get it on Kindle. That’s how I’m making our mashed potatoes this year.
One more Thanksgiving tip:
Brine your turkey! It’s simple and makes all the difference for a juicy bird. Here’s how.
Jessica, I hope this tip for keeping potatoes from turning brown helps you out! Happy Thanksgiving! (Have a question? Submit it in the contact me section.)
I love a good, juicy ham on Easter and Christmas (and any day in between). Too often the hams we’ve had are dry, expensive and sickeningly sweet, even when we bought the high-priced, big name hams from the ham store. It’s enough to make a person sit down and cry into her taters. Therefore, we took it upon ourselves to find the cheapest, tastiest method of preparing ham that we could…just for you. You’re welcome.
optional ingredients for an optional sauce – ours only requires brown sugar and a sauce pan
Which ham should I buy?
The most convenient ham is, naturally, the spiral-sliced. Our experience with spiral cut, however, is that they dry out very easily. Because they are already cut, the heat has more surface area from which to draw moisture. Nothing can prevent moisture loss to some extent, not even the reams of aluminum foil we use to try and prevent its drying out.
For that reason, we buy unsliced ham, which, to our delight, is cheaper. I like the shank, because it is often the cheapest of all and not too difficult to slice. You can also grab yourself a nice butt which will work just as well for the same price or just a few pennies a pound more, depending on your store. According to our old butcher, the shank and butt are essentially the whole ham (which is the leg) chopped in half to form the separate cuts. With such little difference, I go for whichever is cheaper. (Here’s more than you ever wanted to know about ham cuts.)
Watch for a sale around the major holidays and you’ll really score big with your ol’ pigskin.
How do I cook the ham?
Preheat your oven to 350.
Put the ham in a pretty (okay, so it doesn’t have to be pretty) roasting pan with the bone side down, fat side up.
Add one cup of water to the pan. (Some experts say not to do this, but I do it…so there, experts!)
Cover it completely with aluminum foil. But aluminum foil will kill you! I know, but this ham is so juicy, you’ll die happy.
Cook to the proper temperature as explained below, and immediately remove it from the oven.
Let the ham rest covered for 20 minutes or so before slicing, so the juices redistribute throughout the ham.
How long do I cook the ham?
If the ham is pre-cooked, heat it to an internal temperature of 110-140 (Fahrenheit) and pull it from the oven, depending on how warm you want your ham. (If it’s fully cooked, you can theoretically eat it cold.)
If the ham is not pre-cooked or only partially cooked, heat it to 150-155 (Fahrenheit) and pull immediately. I know the meat police say 160, but it will continue cooking 5-10 degrees after you pull it. I pull at 150. If you wait for 160, you may have a dry ham. You’ve been warned.
Use a meat thermometer! Insert it well into the meat, but not touching the bone. if you don’t have a meat thermometer and you cook meat, buy one. If you don’t want to buy one, you’ll be cooking roughly 20-30 minutes per pound, but I won’t guarantee that your stove doesn’t run hot and that you won’t be eating a football. In that case, I wash my hands of your ham.
I won’t even go there! Okay, maybe just a little. There are as many ham glaze recipes out there as there are cooks to prepare them. Personally, I don’t like to be knocked out by an overwhelming shot of sugar, bourbon, cloves, or pineapple when all I really want is a nice big mouthful of meat. I want to taste the ham! Is that so wrong?!
Are you with me? It’s okay if you’re not, because you can do a quick search on any recipe site for half a gazillion glazes. Here are 68 glaze recipes from my favorite recipe site, AllRecipes.com. Read the reviews and pick your favorite…but might I recommend you keep it simple?
Because my husband likes the option of a subtle sweetness with his ham, and others in my family like the option of eating ham without going into a diabetic coma, this is the method he whipped up:
The Simple Homemaker’s Husband’s Simple Ham Sauce
Pour the pan drippings into a saucepan.
Add 1/4 cup or so of brown sugar or honey (depending on how sweet you want it and how much juice you have).
Heat it on the stove stirring to dissolve the sugar or honey, and testing for the sweetness level you’re looking for.
Adjust with water if it’s too salty or thick, and sugar or honey if you want a sweeter juice. Taste as you go and adjust gradually.
Serve it on the side as an optional au jus.
It is simple and delicious, but doesn’t coat the ham with sugar, which many people in my family can’t (or won’t) eat.
Insert your knife parallel to the bone and cut entirely around it. (Remember, the two L’s in the word “parallel” are parallel to each other, if you forgot your basic math.)
Slice perpendicular to the bone to make nice slices that should fall away from the bone. (You will be cutting into the length of the bone, not the end…obviously.) Do this on either side of the bone.
There will be quite a bit of meat left on the bone, just as with the store-bought spiral cuts. I like to gnaw on this when nobody’s looking remove this meat later with a small knife and use it for any number of recipes needing diced ham, including scrambled eggs, bean or potato soups, fried rice, quiche, breakfast potatoes, salad.
Save the bone and toss it into a soup, crock of beans, or pot of jambalaya.
Here’s the boring printable version of how to bake a ham:
How To Bake a Simple Ham
Author: Christy, The Simple Homemaker
Prep time:
Total time:
A simple, juicy, affordable ham that will not put you into a diabetic coma…at least, I hope it won’t.
Ingredients
a ham
pan
one cup water (optional)
aluminum foil
meat thermometer
oven
optional ingredients for an optional sauce – ours only requires brown sugar and a sauce pan
Instructions
Preheat your oven to 350.
Put the ham in a pretty (okay, so it doesn’t have to be pretty) roasting pan with the bone side down, fat side up.
Add one cup of water to the pan. (Some experts say not to do this, but I do it…so there, experts!)
Cover it completely with aluminum foil. But aluminum foil will kill you! I know, but this ham is so juicy, you’ll die happy.
Cook to 150 using a meat thermometer if your ham is uncooked or partially cooked. If it’s fully cooked, warm it to your desired temperature, but no warmer than 140 or you may dry it out. Blech.
Immediately remove it from the oven.
Let the ham rest covered for 20 minutes or so before slicing, so the juices redistribute throughout the ham.
Remove the drippings to a saucepan over low heat. Stir in 1/4 cup brown sugar or honey, taste, and add more if desired to sweeten the juices to your desired sweetness. Serve on the side so everybody is happy!
3.1.09
I hope your ham turns out as juicy and delicious (and affordable) as ours! Good luck!
Let me know what you think, including your best pointers on how to bake a ham…a simple ham.
But if you talk about scoring the outside in cross hatches, stuffing cloves all over, dousing it in bourbon, and then adding pineapple and maraschino cherries, I’ll know you didn’t really read this post and don’t embrace my “simple” philosophy. (Wink.)
I’m embarrassed to admit that I have no pictures of our own hams. Years of ham baking and experimentation, and nothing to show for it but full tummies. Special thanks to all the photographers credited above…but our hams look juicier. A-hem.
You were just about to try The Simple Homemaker’s fantastic Sleeping Baby Biscuits when you realized, rats, you’re out of baking powder.
No problem!
This simple baking powder recipe will teach you how to make baking powder in under a minute…barring any unforeseen kitchen tragedies.
How to Make Baking Powder: A Simple Baking Powder Recipe
Simple Baking Powder Recipe
Author: Christy, The Simple Homemaker
Prep time:
Total time:
Running low on baking powder? No problem! Learn how to make baking powder in under a minute with this simple baking power recipe.
Ingredients
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoons cream of tartar
Instructions
Mix the baking soda and cream of tartar. Use in place of one tablespoon of baking powder.
Mix only as much as you will use right away. If you wish to store it for long term use, add a teaspoon of corn starch, potato starch, or arrowroot powder and seal it in an airtight container prominently labeled “My Amazing Homemade Baking Powder,” ‘cuz who doesn’t need a little pat on the back in the kitchen!
Multiply the quantity of ingredients by how much baking powder you need, keeping in mind that there are three teaspoons in one tablespoon. Hello, math skills! (Cheat: if you need 2 tablespoons of homemade baking powder, that’s 2 teaspoons soda, 4 teaspoons tartar, and 2 teaspoons corn starch if you’re using it.)
3.2.1263
Whether you want aluminum-free baking powder, need corn-free baking powder, or simply ran out, this baking powder recipe has got you covered. Did you ever think learning how to make baking powder could be that simple?
When I was a wee lass, we woke from our dreams of dancing sugarplums to a Christmas morning breakfast of 27 varieties of Christmas cookies: fudge, snickerdoodles, chocolate-covered pretzels, chocolate crackles, spritz, and 22 others, including my personal favorite, pecan fingers. Drooool! It was this ol’ gal’s a child’s dream breakfast! Yeah, my mom rocked the motherhood thing! Because she had done all the baking ahead of time, there was no cooking for Mom on Christmas morning. Smart mom!
It turns out I’m not quite as much fun as my mom on Christmas morning. Translation: no cookies for breakfast. Bummer. I know, I know…but it’s a blood sugar thing. Christmas breakfast at The Simple Home must meet these basic requirements:
1) Minimal sweeteners
2) Protein for blood sugar or I will turn Grinch-green!
3) Carbs to stick to the ribs all morning
4) Little to no work in the morning, because I’m a Christmas morning lazy butt nobody wants to wait around for me to cook when there are stockings to pillage.
5) Delicious!
Here are some of my top ideas for a breakfast that fits all (or at least most) of the TSHM criteria for a Christmas morning breakfast.
5 Christmas Morning Breakfast Ideas
1) Gingerbread waffles–personally, I don’t have time for waffles on Christmas morning, because we have chocolate-filled stockings waiting. Still, doesn’t this recipe from At The Picket Fence look divine. I would make them ahead of time and pop them in the toaster on Christmas morning–brilliant! (Yup, I just patted my own back. Pathetic.) Just so you know, if you use margarine instead of butter I will disown you, and if you’re not family, I will make you family and then disown you, and you know I’m insanely serious about that.
2) Overnight crockpot oatmeal–this is healthy and kinda boring, but you can make it more exciting with these 40 topping ideas from This Chick Cooks. How about a big fat chocolate santa right in the middle of each bowl. Wheeeee! (Might as well just go with the cookies.) Here’s a recipe for crockpot oatmeal from Mommy’s Kitchen. Some of my kids would disown me if we had oatmeal at Christmas, and I know they’re insanely serious about that!
3) Overnight French toast—this recipe from Pioneer Woman has masses of sugar in it, which is in obvious violation of TSHM Christmas breakfast requirement number one, but who cares? (I know–eat the cookies!) I would use my super simple homemade bread recipe…or I would buy a 99-cent loaf of bakery bread any ol’ place and be happy. (Hey, did you notice that “toast” is not capitalized? Only “French” is proper and therefore capitalized. Take note. It matters…to nobody except me.)
4) Freezer smoothies–assemble the smoothie ingredients in advance as suggested in this post at Keeper of the Home. Skip the sweetener and have an extra cookie. Yum. If you have a wimpy blender, set the bags of fruit out to thaw for a while before blending. If you have a power monster, like a Vita-Mix or Blendtec, just grind those babies up.
5) Egg bake–this right here is our go-to Christmas morning breakfast…followed rapidly by a Christmas cookie tray. See, I’m fun. Wheeee! Our two favorite breakfast casserole recipes are from my grandma and from Father Tim in Jan Karon’s Mitford Cookbook and Kitchen Reader. Father Tim’s is appropriately titled Father Tim’s Christmas Morning Breakfast Casserole. We just call it delicious. Check it out here. If you want to go all out and make your own breakfast sausage, here’s the basic recipe we use; actually, we’ve changed it so much, there’s no resemblance. Sorry.
Remove the yolks to a bowl and break them apart with a fork.
Add mayonnaise one spoonful at a time until you’ve reached your desired moisture level. Add mustard and salt to taste.
Combine until smooth or the texture of your choice.
Spoon or pipe into the egg white hollows.
Sprinkle with paprika, or top with red peppers or green onions if desired.
Deviled Eggs Recipe Tips
For perfect hard-boiled eggs with bright yellow yolks, click here.
Wipe the knife after cutting each egg to keep the whites clean.
Cool eggs are easier to slice cleanly than warm eggs.
If desired, spoon the filling into a plastic bag, seal, and snip the corner off. Squeeze the bag to pipe the filling into the eggs.
If you mess up some of the eggs while peeling, throw them in with the yolks to mash into filling. Click here for easy-peel eggs.
Here’s the printable version:
Deviled Eggs Recipe
Recipe Type: Appetizer
Author: Christy, The Simple Homemaker
This basic deviled eggs recipe lends itself to a lot of variations to suit your fancy.
Ingredients
12 hard-boiled eggs
1/2 cup mayonnaise (or to your preference)
2 teaspoons mustard
1/2 teaspoon salt
pinch of pepper, optional
paprika
optional green onions, red bell peppers, or any other pretty garnish
Instructions
Peel eggs.
Cut the eggs in half lengthwise.
Remove the yolks to a bowl and break them apart with a fork.
Add mayonnaise one spoonful at a time until you’ve reached your desired moisture level. Add mustard and salt to taste.
Combine until smooth or the texture of your choice.
Spoon or pipe into the egg white hollows.
Sprinkle with paprika, or top with red peppers or green onions if desired.
Notes
Wipe the knife after cutting each egg to keep the whites clean.
Cool eggs are easier to slice cleanly than warm eggs.
If desired, spoon the filling into a plastic bag, seal, and snip the corner off. Squeeze the bag to pipe the filling into the eggs.
If you mess up some of the eggs while peeling, throw them in with the yolks to mash into filling.
To learn how to boil and peel perfect eggs, visit www.TheSimpleHomemaker.com
2.2.6
Deviled Eggs Recipe for Stuffed Egg Chicks
For a fun alternative, try these stuffed egg chicks:
Cut a small slice off the wide bottom so the egg stands flat.
Cut the top off. Remove the yolk.
Make the filling as directed above in the deviled eggs recipe. Pipe or spoon the filling back into the larger white segment and top with the small white piece.
Add olive slices or raisins for eyes and a carrot segment for a beak.
Feel free to give your newly formed friends a little personality.
“Aaaaah! Herbie!”
“Okay, Kids, who yolked up in my shell!”
“It happens every Easter, Ethel. He stuffs himself to the eyeballs and then he pays the price.”
What is your family’s unique twist on the basic deviled eggs recipe?
Last year I posted several articles about hard-boiled eggs. They were some of my most popular posts of all time. Apparently, you people are all about the incredible edible egg! And why not! Eggs are awesome. In honor of the amazing egg, here is a round-up of my best hard-boiled egg posts, as well as some newbies.
Check out this picture sent in by my sister-in-law, Karen, one of my most faithful readers from Wisconsin. It shows the difference between their old method of boiling and peeling eggs and the new method they learned right here at The Simple Homemaker. Now that’s a gorgeous egg!
Do you want gorgeous eggs? Easy as pie! Easier, really. Just follow these directions:
For more ideas, I created a Pinterest board entitled Using Up Hard-Boiled Eggs. It’s about using up hard-boiled eggs. Appropriately named, don’t you think? Check it out for more ideas.
)
Peel and rinse the potatoes. (So far so simple.)
Store the bowl in the refrigerator. (I cheat on this step if I don’t have room in the frig. Shhh.)
)
For perfect hard-boiled eggs with bright yellow yolks, 
Wipe the knife after cutting each egg to keep the whites clean.
If desired, spoon the filling into a plastic bag, seal, and snip the corner off. Squeeze the bag to pipe the filling into the eggs.
If you mess up some of the eggs while peeling, throw them in with the yolks to mash into filling. 
